These little fellas are fairly common in New Zealand. The black ones like these are called Variable Oystercatchers and the black and white ones are called Pied Oystercatchers. They live on sandy beaches just above the tide line.

It’s really easy to turn an all black subject like this into a black blob. I usually under exspose the shot a bit or wind down the exposure in Camera Raw Software after I have taken the pic. Camera Raw is really good for this kind of tweaking.